Drive Expansion and Drive Upgrade FAQ

Hey guys...I've been gone quite a while, and haven't kept up on this stuff. I read the FAQ on the first page of this thread, and tried to quickly scan a few other pages, but this thread is so large now, it's hard to find the right info...

I'm trying to expand my TIVoHD with a 2TB drive. Is the 'Broflovski image' still the way to do this, or is there now another way? If so, where can I get the image, and what other tools do I need to apply it? If not, what's the current preferred way to do this? I do have a dual-drive dock, and I could possibly duplicate it, but I know that the Tivo HD can only see 1.26TB unless another 'trick' is used. I could either copy the contents of my current drive, or just use an image...either way works for me...

Hey guys...I've been gone quite a while, and haven't kept up on this stuff. I read the FAQ on the first page of this thread, and tried to quickly scan a few other pages, but this thread is so large now, it's hard to find the right info...

I'm trying to expand my TIVoHD with a 2TB drive. Is the 'Broflovski image' still the way to do this, or is there now another way? If so, where can I get the image, and what other tools do I need to apply it? If not, what's the current preferred way to do this? I do have a dual-drive dock, and I could possibly duplicate it, but I know that the Tivo HD can only see 1.26TB unless another 'trick' is used. I could either copy the contents of my current drive, or just use an image...either way works for me...

Any help would be greatly appreciated...

Thanks!

Click to expand...

Assuming the drive in there currently is smaller than 2TB, check sys info and make sure it's running 11.0k or 11.0m of the TiVo software, then install WinMFS on a PC running XP SP3 or newer.

11.0g or k made it possible for any of the 3 S3 models to successfully boot from and use all of a 2TB drive.

For the 2TB drive, lots of people, including me, have had success with the WD20EURS, which happens to be on sale at the moment.

go to the bottom of the page where it says mirror sites and click on one of the icons (arrow pointing down at old Windows drive icon) on the left.

When you've downloaded it, burn it "as an image" (to make it bootable) to a cd-r.

Almost everybody's diagnostic software is on there (along with all sorts of other stuff that might come in handy some day).

Once you have a tested 2TB drive, hook it and the current TiVo drive up to the PC, boot into Windows, use WinMFS to make a backup image of the current drive if you haven't already.

Click File, then Select Drive, and make sure you pick the current TiVo drive.

Then click View and mfsinfo, just to make sure it doesn't complain about anything being wrong with the drive (I'm assuming, and hoping, you do not have an external drive attached to that TiVo, because that would be a tremendous complication).

Then click Save, and think up a file name and tell it where on your Windows drive to save the info as a text file. It'll save the contenst of all 3 tabs, Zone Map, Partion Map, and Misc. in that one file.

Then close that and click File, Backup, TiVo Drive (truncated), and tell it where on your PC's own hard drive you want to save the image--it'll be in the 200 to 600MB range.

Then use WinMFS to do an mfscopy.

The source drive, the current TiVo drive should still be selected.

Click Tools, mfscopy, then make sure it shows the right drive as the source drive and select the 2TB drive as the Destination Drive.

There will be 2 Options available for you to check or not.

The second one, No Optimized Partition Layout, you want to leave not, repeat NOT, checked, because you DO want to have the optimized layout on any TiVo newer than a Series 1.

The first option lets you specify a different swap partition size from the default, which is the 128MB of the one on the source drive.

You don't want to make it any smaller.

A lot of people leave this unchanged and seem to get along okay.

Others of us make it bigger "just in case".

The old rule of thumb, from when exceeding 127GB on an expanded Series 1 drive was bleeding edge, was 1MB of swap for every 2GB of total drive size.

That would work out to a swap size for a 2TB of 1000MB, which is about 15 minutes of analog standard definition video recorded at Best Quality.

I figure it's cheap insurance, but that's just me.

So decide for yourself, then click start and wait.

It'll copy over the TiVo software and all of your settings and recorded shows.

It may appear to have frozen.

Just let it keep going.

When it finishes, it'll tell you that you have extra space on the new drive and ask if you want to expand.

Tell it no.

Go to File, Select Drive, and this time select the 2TB drive, then click on mfsinfo and see if everything looks okay.

The Partition Map tab should show the same partitions as before, possibly with a larger swap partition if you went that route, and at the end a big ol' Apple Free partition.

If everything looks cool, click on Tools and then on mfsadd. That'll turn that Apple Free partition (which is what the Apple Partition Map turns unpartitioned space into--that's Apple thinking for you, unpartitioned space is a partition, just like the map itself is a partition) into a 3rd MFS pair, filling the rest of the drive.

That's it. Back out of WinMFS, shut down Windows, put the drive in the TiVo, and plug it in.

Actually you should have left the original drive on the drive bracket this entire time, and plug the combo data/power cable into the 2TB now that it's ready to test in the TiVo and hang it upside down over the back of the chassis (it'll make sense when you do it) and plug in the TiVo and make sure the new drive works okay.

If everything's cool, shut down the TiVo, take the old drive off the bracket and put it somewhere safe for possible future reference as a troubleshooting aid, put the new drive on the bracket, put the bracket back in the TiVo, make sure there aren't any unconnected cables, put the cover back on the TiVo, and enjoy.

How do you run wdidle if you don't own a PC? I have an iMac and a Macbook Pro.

Click to expand...

wdidle3.exe

is on the Ultimate Boot cd, from which you would boot.

You just have to have the WD drive connected to a SATA port on the motherboard and not through a second layer like a USB adapater.

And if there are any other WD drives connected to that computer, disconnect them before booting, as wdidle3 doesn't offer an opportunity to tell it which WD drive you want to change, and will probably try to do all of them or maybe not to the one you want done.

You just have to have the WD drive connected to a SATA port on the motherboard and not through a second layer like a USB adapater.

And if there are any other WD drives connected to that computer, disconnect them before booting, as wdidle3 doesn't offer an opportunity to tell it which WD drive you want to change, and will probably try to do all of them or maybe not to the one you want done.

Click to expand...

I have a WD drive inside the computer. The iMac has the harddrive installed inside the monitor, and its very tricky/difficult to open.

Moroeover, I don't have any Windows simulation software or Bootcamp installed so I can't run any .exe files.

The drive I ordered is the WD30EFRX, which has Intellipower (not Intellipark) from what I can gather through a Google search. That means I shouldn't have to worry about running wdidle, right? I'm not about to purchase a PC just to do run some program.

"If everything's cool, shut down the TiVo, take the old drive off the bracket and put it somewhere safe for possible future reference as a troubleshooting aid, put the new drive on the bracket, put the bracket back in the TiVo, make sure there aren't any unconnected cables, put the cover back on the TiVo, and enjoy."

Unitron...Thanks so much for taking the time to give such a detailed response...much appreciated!

I'll be attempting to do this this weekend (I THINK!), and I'll let you know how it goes...

I did pick up a couple of the WD20EURS drives from the Newegg sale...I've wanted to do this for a while, and the sale was what gave me the 'kick' I needed...

One last question...is the procedure the same for putting a 2TB drive in the TIVoHD XL, or does something change?

Thanks again!
_________
Oh, BTW...I do NOT (never have and never will) have an external drive hooked up ...

"If everything's cool, shut down the TiVo, take the old drive off the bracket and put it somewhere safe for possible future reference as a troubleshooting aid, put the new drive on the bracket, put the bracket back in the TiVo, make sure there aren't any unconnected cables, put the cover back on the TiVo, and enjoy."

Unitron...Thanks so much for taking the time to give such a detailed response...much appreciated!

I'll be attempting to do this this weekend (I THINK!), and I'll let you know how it goes...

I did pick up a couple of the WD20EURS drives from the Newegg sale...I've wanted to do this for a while, and the sale was what gave me the 'kick' I needed...

One last question...is the procedure the same for putting a 2TB drive in the TIVoHD XL, or does something change?

Thanks again!
_________
Oh, BTW...I do NOT (never have and never will) have an external drive hooked up ...

Click to expand...

It's exactly the same steps for an original S3 (TCD648250), an HD (TCD652160), and an HD XL (TCD658000).

Make sure you've already been updated to at least 11.0k, which it should have been a year or 2 ago.

I have six SATA drives connected to my Mac Pro. If I had the source code to wdidle, I might be able to run it on my Mac. Or on my Linux box.

Click to expand...

If you "knew" that, why did you say it is "Windows only". It has nothing to do with Windows. It's your hardware that is the relevant factor, not the OS. If you can boot and run the CD, you're good. You may have meant that it is limited to "PC" but even that is not true.

It's exactly the same steps for an original S3 (TCD648250), an HD (TCD652160), and an HD XL (TCD658000).

Make sure you've already been updated to at least 11.0k, which it should have been a year or 2 ago.

(and should have updated to 11.0m in the last 2 or 3 months)

and you can go up to a 2TB drive on any of those 3 models.

Click to expand...

I had a change of plans, so I attempted to upgrade the Tivo HD today. I put both the TIVO drive and the new 2TB drive in a USB 3.0 dual-bay drive dock. I got through and started running Mfscopy. All appeared fine until I got about halfway through and it froze. I know that the instructions say that: "it may appear to have frozen. Just let it keep going."

It's been 'frozen' now for about 2 hours, with absolutely NO activity on either drive. Is this 'normal'? Is so, can someone give me an idea approx. how long it will take before it starts 'going' again?

I had a change of plans, so I attempted to upgrade the Tivo HD today. I put both the TIVO drive and the new 2TB drive in a USB 3.0 dual-bay drive dock. I got through and started running Mfscopy. All appeared fine until I got about halfway through and it froze. I know that the instructions say that: "it may appear to have frozen. Just let it keep going."

It's been 'frozen' now for about 2 hours, with absolutely NO activity on either drive. Is this 'normal'? Is so, can someone give me an idea approx. how long it will take before it starts 'going' again?

Rick

Click to expand...

Do CTRL+ALT+DLT to bring up task manager and see if it says it's running or something else.

If it says it's running, give it a couple more hours.

Generally WinMFS either runs or out and out crashes and says so, or Windows pops up something to say it crashed.